“It's a good thing he thinks she's cute when she's embarrassed and confused,” Harriet said. “That's another thing, if you get yourself in a jam in the future, Alex, I really think you should see it through and not leave it to one of us to handle.”
“Well, it worked that time, didn't it? Although maybe you're right, I should of stayed out and shot his ass right off that motorcycle. Then we wouldn't be stuck with that bastard. And,” his voice rose, “who the hell are
you
to talk? What about you leaving Laurel in the kitchen with that fancy coffeepot she couldn't figure out? You're the one who's supposed to take care of all that stuff.”
“I thought it amusing,” Harriet giggled. “It's about time that dumb klutz learned to use it. She takes all the credit for what I do, and she can't even boil water.”
“But you're the one who keeps harping that we should quit spooking her.”
“That's right. But
you're
the one who'll ruin it for all of us if you don't stop. That note you sent Laurel was really stupid.”
“Stupid? What about you? You dumb bitch. Was it cool what you did with the kitten? You coulda blown it yourself. Rick was right outside. Laurel almost picked up on the cat hair in the sink. The damn animal lived right next door.”
“So did Rob Thorne! And the filthy little creature was going to mess up my kitchen!” Harriet shrieked. “You know I will not stand for that!”
Jennifer began to wail. “See what you've done now,” Harriet raged. “You woke up the little one.”
Marilyn began to buff her nails and complain that she was not getting enough action from Rick because he was never home.
“I'm lucky he's not, or I'd never get out,” Alex said. “There you go again, just thinking about yourselves.”
“At least somebody here thinks,” Harriet hissed from deep in the tunnel. “What were you going to do if the Thorne kid, or that boy on the beach, caught you? Kiss them on the lips? Or leave one of us out there to deal with it?”
“Leave it alone. I handled it, didn't I?”
“Sure, in your usual cavalier fashion, just like your little visit to the Corleys. If I hadn't found the jewelry you stole strewn around the bedroom ⦠Can't you ever put anything away? What if Laurel or Rick found it?”
“She wouldn't have known what the hell it was,” he sneered. “We all know the broad is no rocket scientist.”
“Rick would have. We'd all be in trouble.”
“Speaking of trouble, Marilyn has got to stay away from Barry at the fitness center. He'll think he's talking to her and say something that blows Laurel's mind. It's too dangerous. Plus he knows Dusty. That fucking bitch has got to go!”
“Christ, I have little enough sex life as it is!” Marilyn wailed. “I was just getting to know that young stud next door, and you blew him away! My personal life is my business.”
“Like hell it is,” Alex said. “Your business is our business. Besides, Barry's gay.”
“He is not!” screamed Marilyn.
“You're right about Dusty,” Harriet said thoughtfully. “She and Rick are out there screwing around together somewhere right now. What if he decided to dump Laurel for her? Dusty has
got
to go.”
“For once,” Alex said happily, “we agree on something.”
Wind punished the trees outside the station, and the air was thick with the threat of rain, though none had fallen as predicted. The weathermen were wrong as usual.
“They got all that radar, barometers and shit and they ain't never right,” Jim said. “Put me in a high-rise building downtown, looking out the window with a pair of binoculars, and I can tell ya what weather is coming. Unencumbered by science, I could do a better job than those half-ass jokers any day of the week.”
A tropical depression was stalled in the Caribbean and weathermen were watching to see if it died at sea or churned up enough energy to give birth to Hurricane Armando, the first of the season. The detectives were still griping about the gaps in Mack's scant reports when they were dispatched on their first call of the night, a possible jumper at Jackson Memorial, the big county hospital.
They left the unmarked Plymouth on the emergency room ramp and met Aileen at the door. Usually unflappable, she looked harried.
“It's the sixth floor.” She waved them toward a waiting elevator held open by an orderly.
“Who the hell is he?”
“A patient.” She handed Rick the chart. “Old guy. Albert Klonsky. In for tests, a little heart, a little emphysema, a little depressed⦔
“Obviously,” he said, his deep-set gray eyes meeting hers for a flick of an instant.
Her mouth crimped slightly with the suspicion of a smile. “Bring 'em back alive,” she said, flashing a thumbs-up as the doors slid closed between them.
Rick grasped the sill and leaned out as the others moved away from the open window. The old man's callused feet groped, inching along the ledge, toes curled as if to grasp the weathered concrete. The wind howled through the canyons of the hospital complex, ruffling his sparse hair and whipping the hospital gown around his bony knees. Chin muscles taut, his eyes bulged as he tried to see the open window without turning his head.
“Kill the walkies,” Rick murmured to those behind him. To the open air, out in the night, he said, “Hi, Al, Albert Klonsky.” He kept his voice pleasant, his expression earnest. “Stay right where you are, and try not to move.” Cars looked small six stories down. A blaring horn sounded like the cry of a soaring bird. The man on the ledge stood rigid, rolled his eyes at Rick, took a deep breath and sidestepped further away. He looked resigned as though it would be no big deal to take a step forward and ride the wind.
“Leave me alone.” The voice came thin and cracked, a wail from a distant echo chamber.
“Nothing is that bad, Pop. We all have our beefs and problems. It's never too late.”
Tears streaked the old man's cheeks and the too-thin shoulders hunched forward slightly like those of a high diver ready to leave the board.
“Hold it, Al.” Eyes tight on the old man, as if they could hold him in place, Rick shrugged off his tan sports jacket. He handed it to Jim, along with his gun. “I'm going out there,” he said softly, loosening his tie.
“Whadda you, crazy? You nuts?” Jim whispered hoarsely.
“I'm afraid the old guy's gonna go.”
Dusty hissed through her teeth, her radio to her ear. “Rick,” she said, her voice an urgent whisper. “Wait for fire, they're going to set up the life pack.”
“How long?”
“ETA is fifteen minutes.”
“Too long. It takes another five to set up the air bag. This guy won't wait.”
“For God's sake⦔
He stepped out of his Florsheims and the window, onto the cold narrow strip of concrete. Wind buffeted his body, stronger than he had expected. It sounded like the ocean in his ears.
“I'm not coming out after you,” Jim warned, in a low mutter. “You know I can't stand heights.”
Rick pressed all of his 170 pounds hard against the face of the building and did not look down. He inched slowly along the ledge.
“What are you doing? Don't come any closer!”
“Albert, this is scary.” Rick's shoulder blades were jammed hard against the cold concrete. He had not been afraid to step out there quickly; now he regretted it. Was that the pattern of his entire life? He remembered he was wearing his favorite suit, the one he had worn the day he passed the sergeant's exam. He hoped he would not ruin it, or worse. The damp and penetrating cold iced his spine, reminding him of something. Eight years oldâan uncle in Vermont showing him how to leave the imprint of angels on a field of white, lying in the snow, his arms spread-eagled, gazing into a chalk-color sky and a pale and tired sun that radiated no warmth. He was certain that it could not be the same fierce sphere that sizzled sidewalks in Miami, where the sun was a promise of life in a city by the sea exploding in verdant splendor, where trees never stood barren, where the landscape was forever green and alive. Now it was dark and his back was cold and drenched in perspiration, despite the wind that droned and hummed through the surrounding maze of buildings.
Wings flapped nearbyâa pigeon, startling them both.
“Don't come closer!” the desperate voice croaked.
“I have to,” he said, knowing he did not. This certainly was in no job description or departmental manual. Police brass would surely criticize this, as they do anything outside of textbook behavior. Sometimes you have to go with your gut feeling. Sometimes it's wrong.
The old man stared. “I wanna die,” he whimpered.
“You'll feel different in the morning. Everything always looks better once the sun comes up.”
“No. Leave me alone.”
“You know what somebody looks like when they fall or jump from this height? The skull shatters, it splits open like an egg.”
The old man seemed unshaken.
“What if you change your mind on the way down? After it's too late? What if you don't get killed, just crippled, and you have to live with that?”
The man in the flimsy hospital gown fixed watery eyes on a dark and misty horizon. Rick slipped his handcuffs from his belt and snapped one around his right wrist. He reached out slowly and clicked the other ring around the old man's hairy left wrist, next to his plastic hospital bracelet. At the sound, the old man swayed slightly, as though about to fall or leap.
Rick shuddered and held his breath. “Hold it. Take it easy.”
He heard muffled curses and frantic radio transmission from the room behind him.
“What'd you do that for?” the old man said.
Rick breathed again, heart pounding. “I don't know,” he said honestly. “But I do know one thing, I don't have the key with me. Wherever we go now, buddy, it's you and me.”
“Why?” The old man arched his neck, and they made eye contact for the first time. “You could get killed. You shouldn't have come out here. I want to die.”
“Well, I don't. And I don't believe you really do, either. Anybody you want to talk to? We can get them here fast.”
“Nobody who cares.” His shriveled face puckered in self-pity and his eyes leaked tears. The wind lashed at their knees, flapping his hospital gown like a sheet on a clothesline.
“I care, Al. I have somebody who cares for me. I think you do too.”
The old man tried to wipe his runny nose on the sleeve of his hospital gown, but the handcuff caught his arm in midair.
“Let's go back inside, have a cup of coffee and talk about it.”
“I can't.” The old man quaked. “My legs are numb. I ⦠I'm dizzy.”
Jesus Christ, Rick thought, not now. Down below, police cars, flashing lights. The fire department's yellow life pack was out there somewhere, on the way, mounted like a giant Mattel toy atop a speeding fire rescue truck. Rick had seen firefighters leap like stuntmen into the big cushiony yellow balloon five stories below during training exercises. He remembered feeling a strong sense of relief that he was not a fireman.
The wind seemed stronger now, a high note sounding in his head. His handcuffed wrist jerked as the old man teetered. Rick braced, trying to hold him taut, back against the building, with his cuffed hand. “Take deep breaths and let them out slow. Slow. Now take a couple of small steps this way. Small ones. Careful. I'll help you balance.”
“I'm scared,” the old man whimpered.
“So am I, Al. You have to help me out. I'm thirty-six years old. I'm gonna get married. Her name is Laurel. We're about to set the date. I forgot to tell you about that.”
“Tying the knot?”
“That's right. I love her, Al, and she needs me. Help me get to go on the honeymoon. Come on, now, little steps. Sidestep. Sidestep. One, two. One, two. That's it. Our own chorus lineâbut no high kicks, Al.” The bare feet crab-stepped, then faltered. The old man stared at the gathering traffic and upturned faces in the pools of light below.
“You think they got TV cameras down there?”
“Nah, reporters would be yelling âjump.' Let's not give anybody a thrill. You married, Al?”
“Why do you think I'm out here?”
“Atta boy. You still got your sense of humor, you're okay. Let's go back inside where it's warm. Just a couple more steps.”
“I can't. How can we get back in the window?”
“We got out, we can get in. Don't sweat it.” Rick reached the window, grasping the inside frame with his left hand, as the old man minced cautiously toward him. “Okay, Al. Put one foot back inside. Careful now. Somebody will help you. I'll follow you in.”
Rick glimpsed Jim's nearly bald head at the window, heard heavy breathing and realized it was his own.
The old man extended his bare foot. The wrinkled sole, black with grime, groped uncertainly in the air for a moment. Jim caught it solidly by the ankle. Dusty reached up and wrapped her arms around the old man's waist. A smattering of applause and cheers rose from the police, fire and hospital personnel gathered below. Jim and Dusty were slowly lowering him into the room when the old man suddenly flailed both arms. The cuffs yanked Rick's right arm and his feet flew out from under him.
He spun in midair, clawing at the sill with his free hand. The sounds below turned to a something like a sigh, then shouts of alarm.
Dusty, Jim and a uniform clung to the old man, who bellowed as his shoulder wrenched out of the socket and his feet shot toward the ceiling. The grunts and gasps sounded like a wrestling match as they grappled to hold onto the frail body. “Don't let go!” Dusty panted.
“Somebody get a rope!” Jim yelled. “A sheet, anything!” People milled in confusion and panic at the door behind them.